Capital New York

"We need the internet as a collective .... to come out, advocate, let the mayor, let the Council .... know that this is something they want to see the city lead the nation on," Kallos said after the hearing.

Ben Kallos, a Democrat from Manhattan, would like meals that are marketed to kids using toys or other promotional items include a serving of fruit, vegetables or whole grain. The so-called Happy Meals bill would also require that meals be limited to 500 calories, with fewer than 35 percent them coming from fat, fewer than 10 percent coming from saturated fat, fewer than 10 percent from added sugars and fewer than 600 milligrams of sodium.

Kallos cited a 2014 study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which found more than one-in-five New York City children were obese, which the city’s health department believes leads to heart disease, diabetes and other chronic conditions.

“If we continue down this path, children in New York City will have shorter expected life spans than their parents,” Kallos said. “That’s not just depressing, that’s not acceptable.”

A City Council proposal to regulate foods that come with toys split members of the health committee on Tuesday and raised broader issues over what the de Blasio administration can and should do to combat childhood obesity.

Ben Kallos, a Democrat from Manhattan, would like meals that are marketed to kids using toys or other promotional items include a serving of fruit, vegetables or whole grain. The so-called Happy Meals bill would also require that meals be limited to 500 calories, with fewer than 35 percent them coming from fat, fewer than 10 percent coming from saturated fat, fewer than 10 percent from added sugars and fewer than 600 milligrams of sodium.

Kallos cited a 2014 study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which found more than one-in-five New York City children were obese, which the city’s health department believes leads to heart disease, diabetes and other chronic conditions.

“If we continue down this path, children in New York City will have shorter expected life spans than their parents,” Kallos said. “That’s not just depressing, that’s not acceptable.”

The new platform is the result of legislation signed into law last year that required the publication, produced by the Department of Citywide Administrative Services, to be available online in a searchable and machine-readable format, and which was introduced by Councilman Ben Kallos.

New York City Councilman Ben Kallos, who chairs the Council's governmental operations committee, have the board credit for improvements, saying that “great strides” had been made to “improve the process.”

“However, I grow concerned as 2016 approaches and the presidential election, being an election which people will come out and vote for in numbers we haven’t seen since 2012 and most likely 2008 beforehand ... that the N.Y.C. B.O.E. is not relocating staffers to problem areas where lines form,” Kallos told Capital.

Like Reynoso, Councilman Ben Kallos, a Democrat from the Upper East Side and a member of the Progressive Caucus, opposes the cap but supports the study. “The scientific method dictates we look at existing reality as a control before we test our hypothesis,” Kallos told Capital. “The moratorium on Uber is drastic, for every single reason that is being spoused that we need this moratorium we have regulations that have been introduced by Council members that have been sitting there since last year, so this doesn’t seem like an emergency.”

Councilmember Ben Kallos announced his opposition to the cap bill last week. Councilmembers Annabel Palma, Antonio Reynoso, and Robert Cornegy have previously spoken more supportively of Uber, prompting the company to send thank you mailers to residents in the councilmembers’ districts.

City Councilman Ben Kallos, who chairs the government operations committee, has repeatedly raised the issue of the vacancies at public hearings.

"I have identified years-long vacancies for half of the commissioners at the Tax Commission at multiple preliminary budget hearings and I have sought and extended a call for applicants at these public hearings," Kallos told Capital in an email.

Councilman Ben Kallos of Manhattan said Monday that he may hold a hearing into allegations that members of New York Police Department destroyed documents that would show the agency has a quota system for summonses—something top cops have denied for years.

”Destruction of evidence is a serious charge and one that the courts will have to decide on as they move forward," said Kallos, chairman of the Council's government operations committee. "The allegations in this case are troubling for anyone who has ever received a ticket they felt was unfair.”